IN the constant flip-flopping of which foods are good for you, which are bad and which ones change camps with the seasons, the latest news that pregnant women can eat raw eggs must surely be greeted with about as much excitement as Edwina Currie must have felt looking at John Major’s Y-fronts.

After all, who actually wants to eat raw or undercooked eggs? They’re revolting.

I went to work on an egg yesterday and was about 30 seconds short of the perfect poach, leaving me with gloopy bits of white and a yolk that didn’t quite taste of egg yolk yet. Disappointing, and to be avoided, pregnant or not.

My monthly shop is  looking a bit dodgy,

I’VE been involved in a suspected fraud with a major supermarket.

It was flagged up by my bank as “suspicious activity” and the requested payment was refused.

Which was extremely annoying, because it was actually a payment by me to said supermarket for a monthly online shop. I say monthly because I do it every month. Online. Every month.

I even buy mostly the same things (lemons, salmon fillets, cauliflower, an avocado...I won’t bore you with the whole list, simply imagine your produce of choice) and the bill comes to roughly the same amount.

I always use the same supermarket. And it’s always at roughly the same time of month, shortly after pay day. Every month, for, ooh, 10 years or so.

Actually, this makes me sound a bit set in my ways – maybe I need to shake it up a bit... But back to the question at hand.

I truly appreciate the bank’s vigilance in protecting against fraud. You only have to glance through the Adver and most weeks you will find some poor soul has been targeted, more often than not an elderly person whose life savings have been cleared out by odious villains and who will never be able to save such sums again.

And I was very impressed a few years back when the bank contacted me saying roughly £30 or so had been spent from my account on a porn site followed by a donation to Christian Aid. Mmm. Definitely not me, but sounds like someone had a guilty conscience. Who defrauds someone to donate to charity?

Anyway, the bank was excellent, flagged up the suspicious activity, refunded my money and I went on my way.

I like to think the fraudster was caught and dealt with appropriately – porn and Christianity are a rum mix, so I hope he got help.

But I am struggling to see how a monthly online shop with a well-known supermarket counts as dodgy. And it’s the second time it’s happened in as many months.

It took a good hour or so to sort out – talking to the bank, trying and failing to remember forgotten passwords, but eventually, the bank believed I was who I said I was and I really did want some venison steaks and pine nuts and two tubes of toothpaste.

I asked if they could put a note on my account so the payment wouldn’t be refused a third time. Apparently that’s not possible.

So next month I’m going to find the most obscure, far flung online food retailer I can find and order freeze-dried bamboo powder, armadillo jerky and a host of other ridiculous, made-up items and see how they like them apples. Apples. Damn. I forgot to order apples.

Barmy!

WE receive some interesting press releases in the Adver newsroom – and some downright barmy ones. A couple of weeks ago we enjoyed a good titter at a release pointing out the sudden popularity of Pokemon Go and its related dangers – which, according to the PR, meant the good folk of Swindon should rush out and stock up on a new Arnica gel they happened to be marketing.

You can hear the cogs whirring in the PR department... we’re trying to flog a cream for bumps and bruises, there’s a hot new game out which everyone’s playing, people might bump into things... bingo!

This will get everyone talking about our product... But now there’s a new leader in the Hit Parade of Crazy Notions – and it comes from a car park at Heathrow Airport. Or rather a firm which is offering a holiday for your car. Yep, you heard.

This new business, presumably tailored exclusively for the very rich or very daft, allows you to choose a ‘bespoke’ parking space while you’re off on your hols abroad, so your beloved motor can enjoy ‘breathtaking views of the runway for plane spotting’ (the PR in question doesn’t know cars can’t see, obvs) and a “world class service from a concierge and spa therapist”. If I had a car I think I’d like John Waters to read it short stories by Saki at sundown every evening while a string quartet plays Wham tunes in the background. Just as well I’m confined to Shanks’s pony.

Anyway. Apparently this enterprising car parking firm has three spaces, which it trialled for a week, and among the choices is a sandy surface to give your car’s wheels a break from the asphalt. Give me a break. To be fair, some of the suggestions are a bit more sensible – while you’re away, the team will buff your hubcaps, polish your headlights and refill your window washer. You can even opt for a deep clean. But then, continuing the belief that the motor is a living, breathing being deserving of the very best, the press release boasts of the Evening Tuck In.

“For the serious car enthusiast,” it reads (or total nutter, in common parlance), “go the extra mile and order an Evening Tuck In service where an extra warm car cover is wrapped around the car, for protection”. Do what?! Come again? I have a friend who’s very fond of tucking things in. Sounds strange, I know, but as a child he used to tuck his toy pilots into their Airfix aeroplanes to keep them cosy, and even now, the dog gets tucked in every night, and you only have to so much as look like you’re going down with a cold than a blanket’s being pushed up around your chin and under your armpits.

In fact we’ve even joked about setting up a new animal charity campaigning for all beasties small and furry to be tucked up at night to keep them safe and warm. But even we have stopped short of throwing a rug around the telly or popping the laptop under a blanket and leaving on a night light for it.